Category: Product Strategy

Hear from Our Clients About Their Experience of Working with Us

We started our journey in the digital space back in 2012. Our aim was to make a difference — in the lives of our clients, employees, and partners. We do it through our future-focused solutions and reliable services. Every day, we outgrow ourselves by doing things that are difficult and can put our potential to test.

As a team, we love to challenge the status quo if that means helping our clients achieve their goals. We relentlessly pursue growth and love pushing the boundaries of innovation to create something we can be proud of.

At iView Labs, we take customer service very seriously. We go above and beyond to fulfill our client’s vision; be it about creating the next Amazon or executing on a fresh idea that has the potential to beat Amazon.

We say we do everything it takes to make our clients happy. But you don’t have to take our word for it. Here are a few testimonials right from our clients:

“I appreciate their commitment and understanding of the project.”

– Mario Sipek (Project Manager, MachineDesk)

“They were easy to work with, very forthcoming, and demonstrated great skills on this project.”

– Jimmy Nordh (CEO & CTO, Jinoteco AB)

“This company is very professional and they made themselves available working even beyond work.”

– Giuseppe Carullo

image1.png

For us, our client’s satisfaction is the greatest reward. Seeing them succeed is all we want. And thus, to ensure they remain on top of their competition, we train ourselves from time to time and stay updated with the latest trends in the industry.

Everyone including the developers to team leads periodically goes through rigorous training to remain ahead of the curve. Our commitment to our clients is well beyond the time we spend on a project — we make it our duty to ensure our clients have an edge over their competitors.

If you have an amazing idea or a project you need help with, let’s collaborate. With our years of experience and industry expertise, we can deliver bespoke software applications that are robust, reliable, and visually engaging. Our clients range from emerging start-ups to giant enterprises and medium-sized businesses. 

Share with us your requirements and we will be happy to help.

To know more about iView Labs, kindly log on to our website www.iviewlabs.com and to get in touch with us with your queries and needs just write us an email on info@iviewlabs.com and sales@iviewlabs.com. Download the latest portfolio to see our work.

How can agile leadership smoothen Digital transformation?

Introduction

Nowadays more and more businesses are embracing digital transformation (DX) to keep up with the competition. It is projected that spending on digital transformation will reach 1.8 trillion U.S. dollars in 2022 alone. And by 2025, global digital transformation spending is forecast to reach 2.8 trillion U.S. dollars. Spending heavily on digital transformation will take you nowhere if you don’t have the right leadership at the core.

In this blog, we will share five common challenges your teams may face while embracing Digital Transformation and how agile leadership can smoothen the transition. Let’s start with Agile Leadership.

Agile Leadership: A Buzzword or Life Saver?

Every business needs “agile” leaders to thrive in today’s rapidly disrupting economy. While the word agile is borrowed from the world of software development, an agile leader should be flexible, quick to adapt, and fast in decision making.

Agile Leaders:

  • Move quickly
  • Are resilient and creative
  • Don’t hesitate to challenge the status quo
  • Embrace change by driving value
  • Listen, learn, and adapt
  • Are open to change
  • Collaborate
  • Learn continuously
  • Are curious
  • Are flexible

5 Common Digital Transformation Challenges (& How Agile Leadership Can Help)

Employee Pushback

The Challenge:

One of the biggest challenges to digital transformation that almost every company faces is employee adoption. As humans, we love having routines and would do almost everything we can to stay in our comfort zone. Thus, when a company introduces new technologies, employees may feel insecure and hesitant to switch due to the skill gap and fear of change.

Agile Leadership Advantage:

Agile leaders can make the transition seamless by clearly communicating each employee’s roles and responsibilities and how they fit in the bigger picture of digital transformation. It’s also important to address the threat of replaceability your employees may be facing. Assure them that they will be provided with enough training and ample opportunities to learn, grow, and prosper with digital adoption. 

Lack of a Well-defined Strategy

The Challenge:

Most companies fail as they lack clarity and often have a misinformed transformation strategy. This leaves employees clueless as to what needs to be achieved and how to go about it. In order to succeed, you must understand the purpose behind the transformation and have a clear roadmap.

Agile Leadership Advantage:

Agile leaders can save you from haphazard decisions taken without analyzing customer needs, and technology trends. They will first define the problem and work their way backwards. This means defining the end goal and splitting the transformation process into phases — each having measurable targets.

Swapping Old Legacy Business Models & Systems

The Challenge:

Change is difficult. Businesses may find it hard to replace the systems and processes they were relying on to date. For one, it’s a lot of work, and switching to new systems can bring a lot of uncertainty. Adding more to that, the cost of transformation is huge – and can discourage small to medium-sized businesses even before they get started.

Agile Leadership Advantage:

Agile leaders are flexible with their approach and can envision the big picture. In comparison, they are more likely to adapt to new changes than people who have a fixed mindset. Good leaders can inspire their employees to take on innovative projects that can challenge the status quo and contribute to the company’s growth. 

Cybersecurity Risk

The Challenge:

Data breaches and security threats can put off companies from taking up digital transformation. The fear of cybercrime is real as it can cost a company thousands of dollars. They may even lose their user’s trust, which is hard to regain, and the damage caused to the brand can be irreparable.

Agile Leadership Advantage:

Strong and agile leadership will allow you to be proactive and take the necessary precautions to prevent any potential cyberattacks. You can start by training your employees and making them aware of potential security risks. Carry out regular risk assessments and ensure you have a sound risk management strategy to mitigate any attacks.

Adapting to Ever-evolving Customer Needs

The Challenge:

We’re in an experience-driven economy. Users care about their experience more than anything else. And to provide a delightful user experience, you need to understand your users, their needs and then work your way backward in transforming their journey.

With competition getting fiercer, customers have started expecting more personalized experiences. And thus, as a company, if you’re seeking to evolve, you will have to adapt to your customer needs. Most companies fail at digital transformation because they think of it as a one-time project. However, it is an ongoing process that evolves with the user’s expectations.

Agile Leadership Advantage:

Agile leaders can help you stay ahead by constantly seeking feedback from customers and employees. They will ensure you’re heading in the right direction by aligning your strategy and goals with your customers’ expectations. Adapting to your customers may mean focusing only on the communication channels that matter or embracing an omnichannel approach towards communication.

Final Words

Digital Transformation is all about enriching your customers’ journey at every possible touchpoint. The transition may be challenging, but having an agile leadership by your side will make the shift almost seamless. 

If you’re seeking to embrace digital transformation but are not sure how to go about it, let us help. Whether you’re seeking to boost your company’s productivity or enhance customer experience, our experts can steer your journey in the right direction. With our time-tested methodologies and proven processes, we will ensure you succeed with your digital transformation goals.

Share with us your vision of digital transformation, and our consultants will be happy to help.

To know more about iView Labs, kindly log on to our website www.iviewlabs.com and to get in touch with us with your queries and needs just write us an email on info@iviewlabs.com and sales@iviewlabs.com. Download the latest portfolio to see our work.

Low Code Platforms and its Pros & Cons

Introduction

Low-code platforms like Bubble have empowered millions of businesses to create production-ready web applications in no time. Using such platforms, even individuals with zero coding skills can create amazing web applications that are future-focused and scalable.

Even giant enterprises and web professionals have started reaping the rewards of low-code platforms to automate and expedite the development process. In this blog, we will understand what low-code platforms are, their pros and cons, and how you can use them to speed up your development process.

Let’s get going.

What Are Low-code Platforms?

To put it simply, low-code platforms enable users to build interactive web applications without writing a single line of code. How, you ask? Low-code platforms like Bubble come with a drag-and-drop interface that allows users to visually build applications without getting into the intricacies of coding.

You can build and deploy applications that can be scaled easily as and when needed. Low-code platforms are cloud-based — that means you don’t have to worry about setting up the back-end, and you will be able to access them from anywhere.

Marketshare

Low code is fast becoming the preferred method of software development in IT, according to the Gartner’s 2020 Magic Quadrant for Low Code Application Platforms: “By 2024, 75% of large enterprises will be using at least four low-code development tools for both IT application development and citizen development initiatives.”

That’s not all. The low code market is expected to increase from its $10.3 billion market value back in 2019 to $187 billion by 2030 as more companies see the benefits of adopting the platform for their business needs. That’s a CAGR of 31.1%.

Having said that, it is safe to say that low-code development is here to stay for a long time and holds great potential.

Pros & Cons of Low-code Platforms

Benefits of low-code platforms are immense. However, they also have a few limitations. Let’s look at both pros and cons of low-code platforms.

Pros:

Shallow Learning Curve, Lower Cost & Deployment Time:

Learning low-code development is fairly easy and self-explanatory. Anyone with little technical knowledge can learn it in limited time and with minimal effort. What’s more, low-code development is cheaper and will cost you less number of development hours as compared to traditional development.

Lower Maintenance

Low-code development platforms are usually monitored and managed by the service provider itself. This means, you won’t have to spend anything on maintenance of the platform. That’s not all. The app you build with low-code platforms will also require little to no maintenance as most of the components used in developing it will be standardized and ready-made.

Increased Productivity

Because low-code development enables organizations to develop more apps in less time, what used to take months can now be developed in just a few weeks…even days. This fosters innovation and boosts productivity.

Improved Agility

Apps developed by using low-code platforms make organizations more agile in the long run. That’s not all, visual design can accelerate the speed of development. This means less coding and automated testing.

Cons

Limited Customization Options

With the modular components of low-code platforms, you can only go so far in customizing your app. Thus, you may have to change your business processes to keep up with the low-code platform.

Lack of 3rd-party Integrations

With low-code, you won’t be able to integrate your other business tools to your application. Thus, scaling up wouldn’t be that easy. You will have to compromise some of the integrations if you’re seeking to develop a low-code application.

You Get Stuck with One Platform

Most of the low-code development platforms will tie with their cloud-based offerings. Thus, you won’t be able to switch platforms frequently. Moreover, hiring software engineers working with that platform can be tricky.

API Development

With low-code development, you won’t be able to develop a proper API. This means if you are seeking to develop an enterprise-class application with intricate features, you must consider other development methods instead of low-code development.

Top 3 low-code Platforms

While there are a lot of low-code development platforms, here are top 3 platforms that stand out from the crowd for their capabilities.

#1 – Bubble

With a thriving community of over 1.3 million users, Bubble is a powerful low-code platform that can help you build production-ready web applications. You can create everything from interactive, multi-user applications for both desktop and mobile browsers. The apps you build can be hosted on Bubble itself – this means you won’t have to worry about managing server and paying recurring hosting charges. Last but not the least, Bubble has a huge ecosystem of extensions that can help you extend the platform as per your needs.

#2 – OutSystems

OutSystems is one of the most promising low-code platforms that can help you create amazing apps swiftly and without much technical know-how. It comes with amazing features like a WYSIWYG editor, drag-and-drop features to build your apps visually, process and workflow mapping, an app marketplace to choose pre-built apps and templates from, and more. While it may take you some time to get accustomed with the system – but once you know how it works, building apps with it can be super fun.

#3 – Appian

Certainly one of the leading low-code development platforms, Appian comes with all the features you’d expect – coupled with a few useful ones. It offers a drag-and-drop visual interface, seamless third-party app integrations and many more. You can also use pre-built apps for creating your own app with minimal changes.

Final Words

Low-code platforms are leading the digital front by bringing in amazing features, unparalleled time-to-value, agility, and scalability. Furthermore, you don’t need to have any technical skills to build applications on low-code platforms.

In case you need help in deciding which low-code platform will be ideal for you, or want us to develop applications for you, let us know. We have been working with low-code development platforms and can help you turn your amazing idea into a clickable reality with minimal time and efforts.

To know more about iView Labs, kindly log on to our website www.iviewlabs.com and to get in touch with us with your queries and needs just write us an email on info@iviewlabs.com and sales@iviewlabs.com. Download the latest portfolio to see our work.

What can you do in Metaverse?

Introduction

The term Metaverse was first coined by Neal Stephenson in his novel, “Snow Crash” released in 1992. And recently enough, Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg announced that they are changing their name to Meta Platforms Inc. or in short, Meta. On a superficial level, this may seem just a name change — but it is well beyond that. In this blog, we will understand what is metaverse, its implications, and how it will affect the way we interact with Facebook. That really sounds exciting, isn’t it?

What is Metaverse?

In simple words, Metaverse is a parallel world where you can experience the internet in 3D. To put it in Mark Zuckerberg’s words, it is a ‘virtual environment’ you can interact with instead of just looking at a screen.

To be more specific, Metaverse will have endless interconnected virtual communities where people can meet, and interact with others via VR headsets, AR glasses, mobile apps, and several other similar devices.

Metaverse will comprise immersive shopping and social media experiences. It will be a place where users can create their own virtual items and playgrounds. They can play 3D games with highly personalized avatars that create a more engaging human experience.

“It’s the next evolution of connectivity where all of those things start to come together in a seamless, doppelganger universe, so you’re living your virtual life the same way you’re living your physical life,”

– Victoria P. (Emerging Technologies Analyst)

What Can you Do In Metaverse?

Metaverse will open up a lot of possibilities and will allow us to harness the untapped potential of the virtual world and social media services. You’d be able to host a virtual concert (or go to one), try/buy new clothes, play personalized games, craft digital artwork, etc.

The metaverse will also allow the employers to create a virtual office where everyone can see and interact with each other as if they were right in front of them. Horizon Workrooms, Facebook’s meeting software, aims to achieve this objective via VR headsets that can turn out to be one of the most immersive experiences of the Metaverse.

“A lot of the metaverse experience is going to be around being able to teleport from one experience to another.”

– Mark Zuckerberg

Tech companies, like Facebook, have a lot of work to do before they can offer a seamless and interconnected Meraverse experience to their users. In an ideal world, people in the Facebook Metaverse should be able to interact and engage with users from Google Metaverse. For that to happen, these companies will have to find common platforms through which they can seamlessly exchange data while keeping users’ privacy intact.

Is Facebook Going All-in on the Metaverse?

By the looks of it, yes. The company is investing heavily into the project as they think it is going to play a major role in the digital economy we’re in. They would be investing about $10 billion on Metaverse this year alone. That’s a huge number.

Facebook has also collaborated with Microsoft and Nvidia to scale the project. That’s not all. Video game companies have also been taking keen interest in Metaverse. In fact, Epic Games has raised over $1 billion from investors to build games compatible with Metaverse.

With the ever increasing hype, more and more companies are jumping into this space. And to ensure they are ahead of the curve, Facebook is going all-in on Metaverse.

Is Metaverse Similar to the Internet?

In one of the interviews, Mark Zuckerberg compared Metaverse with the internet by describing it as ‘an embodied internet’ — a place where people can have immersive experiences that a webpage can not offer.

As a matter of fact, one of the key benefits of Metaverse is considered ‘immersion’ — a sense of physically engaging with the world around you instead of watching them through a tab. For instance, interacting with your employees on Facebook Horizon may feel more natural than Zoom/Google Meet thumbnails.

It’s hard to compare Metaverse with the internet. After all, text-heavy internet comes with a lot of advantages. Buying high-end gaming consoles or supercomputers and VR tech can be expensive. Furthermore, in remote areas where internet connectivity is a challenge, people may not be able to access ‘the Metaverse’.

Thus, it is safe to say that Metaverse cannot replace the entire internet, at least not in the foreseeable future.

Is this a yet another stunt to collect more data?

The Metaverse will give Facebook access to a lot more personal data than the conventional internet. With this project, the company will continue to use personal data to show targeted ads, into the Metaverse.

“Ads are going to continue being an important part of the strategy across the social media parts of what we do, and it will probably be a meaningful part of the metaverse, too.“

Mark Zuckerberg

People are concerned that Facebook trying to enter into Metaverse can give the company access to even more personal data. Given their reputation when it comes to privacy and data management, it’s quite alarming.

Metaverse — A Huge Opportunity

A new era of the internet is being innovated. Its implications on our world will be massive. Companies will have to adapt to this change in order to continue thriving in this new space. They will have to be creative and push limits of innovation to embrace the Metaverse. With so much happening at such a pace, the question is, are you ready for the change?

To know more about iView Labs, kindly log on to our website www.iviewlabs.com and to get in touch with us with your queries and needs just write us an email on info@iviewlabs.com and sales@iviewlabs.com. Download the latest portfolio to see our work.

Low Code No Code Applications for Digital Transformations

Introduction:

Nowadays, a lot of businesses have started leveraging digital transformation to simplify their workflows and get more done with limited resources. Low-code and no-code development will play a significant role in helping businesses achieve their goals. In fact, low-code development platforms are expected to exceed $187 billion in revenue by 2030.

“The future of coding is no coding at all.”

– Chris Wanstrath, CEO at GitHub.

If you, too, are seeking to transform your business digitally through low-code development, keep reading. In this blog, we will be sharing how you can achieve digital transformation via low-code platforms. Before we get started, let’s look at a few low-code platform use cases.

Low-code Platform Usecases:

While there are many use-cases of low-code platforms, some of the most popular ones include:

Customer Engagement Apps: To deliver better customer service and allow your prospects to book appointments or interact with your business.

Business Apps: To streamline operations, supply chain management, and company-wide processes.

Collaboration Apps: That enables your employees to seamlessly manage their tasks, resources, etc.

Why Digital Transformation?

IDC reports, Digitally transformed organizations are projected to contribute to more than half of the global gross domestic product (GDP) by 2023, accounting for $53.3 trillion. Today, if your business isn’t digitally transformed, it won’t be able to stand against ever-changing times and fierce competition. Moreover, scaling up can be extremely challenging if your business isn’t equipped with the latest technologies out there.

Digital Transformation will enable you to:

  • Improve Productivity
  • Foster Innovation
  • Elevate Customer Experience
  • Increase Business Agility
  • Optimize Processes
  • Minimize Costs
  • Increase Speed to Market

Now that you know why you must transform your business digitally let’s see how to achieve it without spending a huge sum of resources.

Practical Usecases of Low Code Applications for Digital Transformation

Low-code platforms can help you solve some of your most intricate business challenges. Let’s look at some practical use cases of low-code platforms and how they can help you embrace Digital Transformation.

Web-based Customer Portal

Delivering a better customer experience is one of the many reasons companies embrace Digital Transformation. This involves developing apps that enhance their interactions across every touchpoint. Enterprises can easily achieve that with low-code platforms via customer engagement apps.

By using low-code platforms, users can develop and deploy apps with little to no coding. These apps can be scaled as and when required. Companies can monitor their performance and optimize them along the way. Thus, low-code development fosters innovation and allows organizations to move quickly.

Learn how SUEZ developed a web-based customer portal and improved their customer experience by allowing their users to perform routine tasks like paying invoices, calculating quotes, etc.

IoT-enabled Smart App

With the help of low-code platforms, your employees can create IoT-enabled smart apps that can be deployed without relying on your IT department. Not only can they make changes in real-time but also retract them easily. Ultimately, this provides more freedom to your employees — to innovate, be creative, and challenge the status quo.

Low-code platforms can enable your employees to get more done in less time — thereby boosting their productivity and improving performance. A recent survey by PTC reveals that 40% of businesses claim to have implemented Digital Transformation to improve their operational efficiency.

Learn how Hortilux — a leading manufacturer, and supplier of grow light solutions — revolutionized the greenhouse industry with an IoT-enabled smart app built with a low-code platform.

B2C Mobile Application

You can create fully functional mobile applications with low-code platforms. These platforms have ready-made templates and features that you can add to your app while developing it. By using low-code platforms, businesses can build custom apps much faster than the traditional approach.

Because many businesses employ digital transformation simply to speed up app development, low-code platforms can come in handy. They can radically decrease the amount of time it takes to launch a product while keeping its quality in check.

Learn how VGZ Cooperative — a leading healthcare insurance provider in the Netherlands — developed a custom mobile app in less time and by spending a fraction of the cost of traditional app development.

Apart from the above-mentioned ones, there are a lot of use-cases of low-code development. For instance, it can be used to develop SaaS apps, core systems, web portals, etc. You can use it for various purposes depending on your requirements.

Is Low-code Better Than Traditional App Development?

Yes. There are so many reasons you should consider low-code over traditional app development. Here are the top 3 reasons:

Improved Agility: Apps developed using low-code platforms make organizations more agile and resilient in the long run.

Cut Development Time: Low-code development can transform months-long projects into weeks-long — thereby enabling faster development.

Effective Risk Management: Unlike traditional development, Low-code platforms allow you to quickly adapt to market norms as and when needed.

Final Words

We hope we could provide you with a few ideas on the implications of low-code platforms on Digital Transformation. The possibilities can be endless. With a perfect blend of DX and low-code development, you can make your business stand out from the crowd.

As of now, well over 89% of businesses have already adopted or are planning to adopt a digital business strategy. With every passing day, the competition is going to get fiercer. Thus, now is the right time to take the leap and transform your business digitally.

If you need our help, let us know. We have helped businesses of every size and scale transform digitally by embracing the latest and cutting-edge tech and resources. Give us a shout, and our team will help you dominate your competition.

To know more about iView Labs, kindly log on to our website www.iviewlabs.com and to get in touch with us with your queries and needs just write us an email on info@iviewlabs.com and sales@iviewlabs.com. Download the latest portfolio to see our work.

An A to Z Guide on Creating Your Own NFT Marketplace

Introduction

It’s high time for NFTs. They are on the verge of being ubiquitous. The sales of NFTs crossed $2.4B in the first 6 months of 2021. That’s not all. The trading volume of NFTs has been soaring across the internet. A popular NFT marketplace — OpenSea reported an 800% increase in trading volume.

With more people joining the club every day, these numbers are bound to increase over time. This means, if you’re seeking to create your own NFT marketplace, there couldn’t be any better time than now. In this blog, we will share everything you need to know to start your own marketplace.

What is a non-fungible token (NFT)?

A non-fungible token (NFT) is like a digital asset representing art, music, videos, game items, etc. They can be traded via cryptocurrency and are built with the same software as other cryptos. What makes an NFT stand out is its uniqueness. Each NFT is unique and irreplaceable. However, you can still trade/sell them on various NFT marketplaces.

Here are a few properties of NFTs:

  • They are indivisible. You cannot divide an NFT or sell a part of it.
  • While it is possible to view an image or artwork for free, there can be only one individual owner at any given point in time. The ownership of any NFT can be easily verified and there’s no way anyone can modify/copy/paste ownership records.
  • NFTs can be scarce as they are launched in limited quantities and cannot be owned by multiple users simultaneously.

Now that you have a brief idea about NFTs, let’s understand more about their marketplaces and how they work.

How does an NFT Marketplace work?

NFT marketplaces work similarly to any other marketplace. Creators can upload their art on the blockchain, and collectors can view and trade it via cryptocurrency. You can create a marketplace for a very specific niche or for multiple industries catering to diversified audiences. 

As far as the revenue goes, most marketplaces collect a commission from all the trades happening there. However, there are many other ways you can generate revenue via a marketplace. For instance, you can levy a subscription fee to sellers/creators or have a fixed cost for registering. You can also consider allocating space for ads either to sellers or advertisers.

Now that we have a brief idea about how marketplaces work and how you can generate revenue from it, let’s look through essential features every NFT marketplace must-have.

Necessary Features of an NFT Marketplace Website

1. Storefront

While this goes without saying, there couldn’t be a marketplace without a storefront. That’s where you can display the products, categories, and feature popular creators on the marketplace.

You should prioritize the information to be displayed on the storefront as it is one of the most important aspects of your NFT marketplace. It should be easy to navigate, intuitive, and must deliver a consistent user experience.

2. Advanced Search & Seamless Navigation

Search and navigation are critical components of your marketplace. You must ensure your marketplace is easy to navigate and the users can find what they are looking for in no more than 4-5 clicks.

To simplify navigation, you can consider adding a mega-menu with explicitly defined categories, sub-categories, and products. For search, you can consider adding advanced filters that allow users to search via product attributes.

3. Seller Profiles/Store

Creating a seller profile will greatly improve the overall shopping experience. Buyers who are looking to buy NFTs only from a specific seller can do so via visiting their profiles. And on the other hand, sellers also get to display their best work in an organized manner.

You can add the seller’s selling history, total NFTs, customer feedback to their profile page. This will also help buyers decide whether to trust a seller or not. For instance, if a seller has less than three stars from five, a buyer will be cautious while dealing with them.

4. Creating Listings

Creating NFT listings will be another basic feature every marketplace should have. This is where sellers can upload their work and list them for auction/sale. They can add descriptions, images, and other relevant details that are necessary.

NFT creators may or may not be tech-savvy. Thus, it is important to keep things as simple as possible here. You don’t want to confuse them with too many options. Keep what’s required and verify the information on each listing before it goes live.

5. Buying & Bidding

While some creators sell their artwork at a fixed price, others prefer to put their work at auction. So it is important that your marketplace offers both options to creators. Auctions should have an expiry date while other listings get automatically removed once the art is sold.

As far as the bidding goes, you must ensure the process is swift and smooth. The information about the latest bid should be updated in real-time so there are no conflicts whatsoever. Having a seamless buying cycle will ensure a good shopping experience for buyers.

6. Wallet

Both the parties, buyers and sellers must have their wallets on the marketplace. They can store, send, and receive cryptocurrencies in exchange for NFTs. Buyers can load crypto to their wallets and sellers can cash it out once received.

There are several wallet systems available in the market. Make sure the one you choose is safe and reliable. The last thing you want is failed transactions and unhappy users. If you can, test different wallet systems before fixating to one.

Conclusion

Apart from the above-mentioned ones, there are several other features an NFT marketplace should have. For instance, the ability to rate a trade post-completion, verify an NFT, and many more. While creating your own marketplace, think of the features that will be usable to your audience. A feature-rich marketplace is bound to thrive even amidst today’s rapidly disrupting economy.

If you’re seeking to develop your own NFT marketplace but don’t know where to start, let us help. We can help you create a high-performing marketplace that consistently delivers a good user experience. Give us a shout, and let our trained professionals help.

To know more about iView Labs, kindly log on to our website www.iviewlabs.com and to get in touch with us with your queries and needs just write us an email on info@iviewlabs.com and sales@iviewlabs.com. Download the latest portfolio to see our work.

NestJS VS. Fastify _ Which One to Use & When

Introduction

Today, Node.js is among the top 10 JavaScript frameworks, primarily because it’s light, scalable and open-source. With the ever-increasing popularity of Node.js, several other frameworks have emerged to help developers build high-performing, reliable, and scalable server-side apps quickly and easily. Two of the most prominent Node.js frameworks are NestJS and Fastify. 

While both frameworks are equally competitive, there are a few things that set them apart. In this blog, we will look at the key differences between the two so you can decide which one’s ideal for you. If that sounds exciting, let’s get going.

NestJS VS Fastify: Top 5 Differences

NestJS and Fastify are fundamentally Node.js frameworks designed to ease out the development process. Let’s look at the top 5 key differences between them.

Overview:

NestJS: 

NestJS was first released in 2017 by Kamil Myśliwiec, who is a Google Expert in Web Technologies and Angular. As a framework, NestJS is heavily inspired by AngularJS. As it is a platform-independent framework, you can create and reuse some of the core elements in different applications. Furthermore, there are no limits to what you can build with the framework. You can develop everything from a minimal web application to a highly intricate enterprise solution.

Fastify:

Fastify was developed by Matteo Collina and Tomas Della Vedova back in 2017. They introduced it at a Node.js Interactive held in Vancouver. Here’s a framework that’s primarily focused on speed and performance (more about that later). It is easy to learn and developer-friendly. In 2019, Fastify joined the OpenJS foundation as an incubating project, and since then, the framework has evolved in leaps and bounds.

Marketshare:

NestJS:

Since the day it launched, NestJS has been consistently growing in numbers. Today, it has over 41.1k GitHub stars and gets downloaded over 764,859 times every week. It is also widely popular among the developer community for it has a shallow learning curve and good performance benchmarks. On StackShare, a popular community-driven SaaS platform that ranks software tools and technologies, NestJS has more followers and votes than Fastify. Last but not least, if we talk about the web, again, NestJS beats Fastify in numbers – for total web traffic and global site rank.

Fastify: 

Fastify, despite being an equally competent Node.js framework, is less popular as compared to NestJS. With over 20.7k stars on GitHub and 234,034 downloads a week, it is known for its speed and performance. Fastify has got its own set of loyal followers on StackShare – which are quite less than NestJS. Keeping the numbers aside, Fastify delivers exceptional performance and can increase your throughput up to 100%.

Core Features:

NestJS:

  • Versatile: You can use NestJS to build any and every type of server-side application irrespective of its intricacy.
  • Highly Scalable: With NestJS, you can start small by building a simple application and scale your way up to an enterprise-class server-side app.
  • Well-documented: Getting started with NestJS becomes super-easy with the huge library of resources available for free on the official website of the framework.
  • TypeScript: Because NestJS uses the latest version of TypeScript, it can change to the JS whilst simplifying context switching.

Fastify:

  • Performance: Being one of the fastest web frameworks, Fastify can serve up to 30,000 requests/second.
  • Extensible: You can seamlessly use Fastify via its hooks, decorators, and plugins. This makes the development process hassle-free.
  • Easy to Learn: Fastify is easy to learn and implement. It is expressive in nature. This means if you know Node.js, you can easily get your hands on Fastify.
  • Giant Ecosystem: Fastify has a huge ecosystem of core and community plugins that are freely accessible and can be used per your needs.

Community & Support:

NestJS:

With hundreds of contributors and thousands of users globally, you can be assured that you will get enough help and support in case you run into any troubles. That’s not all. NestJS also has a thriving community on various other developer forums like Spectrum, npm, Dev.to, and Discord. Additionally, you can also network with other NestJS nerds at various conferences held by community members from across the globe.

Fastify:

Fastify is also backed up by a huge pool of people who maintain and manage the framework. They roll out frequent updates to add new features to the framework and safeguard it from potential vulnerabilities. You can find Fastify forums on Dev.to, GitHub, and Stackoverflow. In case you’re looking for professional help, you can also hire a Fastify developer via platforms like arc or upstack. In case you’re looking for a reliable agency – give us a line, and we will be happy to help.

Popular Usecases:

NestJS: 

NestJS is used by some of the most popular companies like Adidas, Decathlon, Capgemini, Autodesk, etc. You can use it to build robust and reliable server-side applications that are both high-performing and secure.

Fastify:

Several popular companies, including Hotstar, Genesys, Habit, Radity, Microsoft, and NearForm use Fastify for different purposes. It is fast, reliable, and can efficiently handle intricate processes. With a giant ecosystem of 45 core and 155 community plugins, you simply cannot go wrong with Fastify.

Conclusion:

Both NestJS and Fastify are reliable and high-performing Node.js frameworks. Picking one over the other can be really intimidating. Rather than asking which one’s more popular – it’s better to go with the one that’s most optimized for the job. You may consider looking through their documentation and the source code before making a decision. 

If you’re still unsure which one would be right for you, let us help. Having worked with Node.js and similar frameworks for quite a while now, we can not only help you pick the right framework but also develop a robust and reliable application that stands true to the time. To get started, simply give us a line, and our team will be happy to help.

To know more about iView Labs, kindly log on to our website www.iviewlabs.com and to get in touch with us with your queries and needs just write us an email on info@iviewlabs.com and sales@iviewlabs.com. Download the latest portfolio to see our work.

How can Single Sign-On help companies to be more secured?

Managing a company and its users, its identity & access management across various SAAS applications for a company is a cumbersome process. As per Blissfully 2020 report, a company size (0-10) has about 47 relationships from a  person to app, for a company size of (11-50), it has about 189 relationships from a person to app and a company size of (51-100), it has about 584 relationships from a person to app. By this number we can know about the growing complexity between a person working at the company and its usages of apps,its relationships and secured management of the same.

With this growing complexity we realise there is a risk which a company, however small or big, has to address in terms of management of users, its identity across apps and its strong security compliance it needs to adhere to mitigate the risk of cyber attacks or breaches.

Usernames and passwords are the primary objectives of cybercriminals and is a risk which a business possesses if it is not secured enough. According to the research of TechCrunch 59% use something very similar or comparative passwords on numerous records. 

In this manner, if a hacker gets access through one inadequately obtained site, they will probably have the option to access other SAAS applications of the company. As per WEF Global Risk Report, cyber attacks is the fifth top rated risk for public and private companies.

So, what can a company(small, mid to large) do to have a centralized, secured and an effective way to manage users identity and its access to all its enterprise SAAS applications?

Enterprise Single Sign-ON

Enterprise Single Sign On is a way to authenticate to enable enterprise users to log in with a single ID and password within multiple SAAS applications.  Single Sign-on or SSO sets up a trusted relationship between a service provider and an identity provider. The company user, its identity and its access management is linked with three-layered administration of the account, which covers the secured creation, access, deletion, and updation.

How Single sign-on works? 

 In the most common cause, the identity provider and service provider set up a trust relationship by exchanging digital certificates and metadata and communicate with one another via open standards like Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML), OAuth, or OpenID. 

You will also want to keep in mind that your SSO platform needs to integrate into a larger organizational IT architecture, and you need to think cautiously about how to do so while maintaining the entire security posture. For example, an SSO system might make it impossible to downstream the security tools to identify the authentic IP address of the user attempting to log in to the system

How can SSO benefit the company and its users?

  • Centralized identity & access management for company’s apps
  • Lessens the burden to manage different passwords and access for applications
  • Unified security policy and compliance for access and password management
  • Reduce risk and exposure for cyberattacks
  • SSO can also assist with industry regulations, like HIPAA, that require successful authentication of users who are accessing electronic records or who require audit controls to follow activity and access.
  • This unified framework offers easy access to the management system of the central directory to de-provision users and makes the process faster and cheaper. The policies can be directed based on the user role, location, and other traits. If an enterprise implements a quality solution, it enhances security, usability and saves time and money for the respective department.

Single sign-on solutions

There are different forms of SSO solutions like AWS Single Sign On, Google Cloud SSO, Microsoft for your company  to consider depending on your company’s needs based on the users you have or apps that you are using. The right solution depends upon a lot of factors before you make a decision. 

At iView Labs, we help you to assess and identify the right solution for you depending upon your company, the no. of users and what kind of applications your company and its users are using.

Secure your users’ access for multiple cloud applications by SSO.  Do reach us with your problem or queries at sales@iviewlabs.com

To know more about iView Labs, kindly log on to our website www.iviewlabs.com and to get in touch with us with your queries and needs just write us an email on info@iviewlabs.com and sales@iviewlabs.com. Download the latest portfolio to see our work.

Real World Implication of Microservices in the Fintech Industry

The transformation of the monolithic architecture to microservices architecture is one of the most heroic steps that you might take to upswing your business. So, if you are really looking forward to scale your infrastructure and also speed up while deflecting high supervision costs then microservices is the right solution. 

Especially, in a FinTech ecosystem that is running to establish itself in the digital centric world. And this being the reason that they are experimenting their digital approaches with highly scalable, flexible, and efficient architectures for their infrastructures. To get an outcome of performing well in the competition; and also satisfying and solving their customers’ issues.  

The outmost benefit of Microservices Architecture is its capability to provide flexibility, structural scalability, and reduced costs. The Monolithic structure has often failed when you want to scale your architecture. And since, financial services can never remain constant there is always scope to extend its capabilities as the world is changing. 

The long before financial institutions have legacy systems that carry the baggage of centralized database that are tightly coupled sub system. Microservices give them an approach to separate database from every services. Whenever a new service or a feature is deployed in an infrastructure or product then it has its own separate database and this way entire system doesn’t get affected. The architecture offers solution to fetch the only required data belonging to a specific service. The service reflects through an endpoint or a middleware platform, implying that a large scale service can be implemented with No SQL database for heavy scenarios. 

Example of a real life Bank with Monolithic architecture:

Danske Bank worked on the monolithic architecture that mostly relied on the sharing of the resources and therefore the processes couldn’t function independently. The major issue with the monolithic architecture was its scalability and maintainability. Their system wasn’t componentized and shared software libraries. Also monolithic architecture has stack dependencies that stops the embedment of the latest technologies. Additionally, with this architecture banking application had the fear of sending over unencrypted data of the users. 

Monolithic application involves huge and complex code, making the response time of a web application high, and also, unacceptable.

And as the web service coincides with the monolith ecosystem, they have a greater downtime and are unavailable each time there is an integration or upgradation of new feature in the application. Which states that the B2B dependency on the application can further complicate decision-making.   

Example of a real life Fintech organization having Microservice architecture:

Monzo Bank, a London Based bank uses microservices architecture to build a mobile first U.K digital bank. It has established a cloud native mobile-first digital bank while also complying with regulations. It has the technology foundation that can provide what all the traditional banks cannot  with an additional cloud enabled advantage. 

Monzo uses AWS hosting for its core banking needs to enable scalability and flexibility with its cloud computing strength, also eliminating the doubts in terms of capacity, infrastructure, and provisioning management. 

Monzo has established its core banking systems from scratch with the help of microservices architecture, with multiple virtualized servers having container tools such as Docker and Kubernetes. It architecture makes a hub of small elements that can scale as an entity, communicate synchronously or asynchronously, and have APIs. Their banking application also has a platform-agnostic for easy interoperability. 

Outcome of adopting such a system

  1. Monzo runs on an active data centre that avoid any failures or downtime attached to their banking application
  2. Its AWS hosting offers sophisticated security, auditability, and encryption levels to remain compliant with the banking regulations. 
  3. Their customer experience is powered by technology making them, by far the most significant is customer centricity; elevating and enhancing their infrastructure according to the competitive landscape for FinTech organizations today.
  4. Their core banking system has a technology architecture that is open, agnostic, scalable, secure, and 3rd Platform–enabled.
  5. As a startup it always had the advantage to develop its infrastructure from scratch and be totally cloud driven.  From the very start they understood that simple computation won’t take them out of the firewall but rather give them a data driven and secure architecture that can totally redesign their system’s infrastructure.

The biggest benefit Monzo has gained from microservices is organisational flexibility, Suhail Patel, Monzo’s backend engineer explained this by quoting – 

“We build services which are granular enough to be easily understood. Ownership of services is well-defined but can be fluid based on the goals of the company. Monzo has grown significantly over the past 24 months; the structure of existing teams and emergence of new teams has changed significantly as a result.”

Benefits of inducing Microservices in financial institutions 

There are considerable advantages that microservices can provide with a robust IT strategy that is sufficient for smooth transition. 

  • Transmission and redeployment of new application features without fear of failing the entire application.
  • Increased agility and decoupled release cycles implying app updates can be developed and deployed within hours.
  • With microservices architecture the infrastructure can be easily replicated and can be more effectively help in scaling growth in terms of users and transaction volumes. 
  • As database is much less interdependent, microservices can level down failure footprint. 
  • Microservices architecture makes banking application easier to refactor or replace going forwards.
  • As microservices can be easily replicated it can help increase structural scalability. 
  • Microservices architecture helps provide improved security levels in the application this way the threats do not breach the entire app and the other elements can left protected. 

Microservices Architecture – Ideal platform for Platform Banking 

Microservice architecture provides accelerated integration with the third parties and efficiency in the process, which proves to be a major competitive factor in the platform banking ecosystem. The traditional banking system that goes with the monolithic approach has multiple points of integrations and batch processing which is highly inefficient and slows the entire process. And the microservices architecture can bring in a phased approach that minimises risk with a deliberate process in the near-term and long-term objectives. Each element can be developed, updated, and managed independently, making microservices based applications easier to work on and maintain. 

To Conclude

Banks and Financial Institutes must adopt microservices architecture in order to create and enter new markets, and also establish themselves rightly to gain all the profits that a new market can offer. With the platform banking the FinTech industry will not only introduce new sources of revenue, but also present enhanced customer experience along with the improved operational efficiency reciprocating a lot of margin. 

Also, in the long-term, banks and financial institutes must move to a more sophisticated microservices based core platform in coordination with service mesh. Banks are currently trying to develop a marketplace that should have a microservices platform providing and scaling banking services as individual stacks categorized by product domains.

Consider this example, an organization owner can develop a marketplace that can combine industry leading onboarding services from a fintech with its inhouse underwriting capabilities and book the receivables to a third party bank. And also a customer availing a loan from their platform would be able to protect from the various levels in the back end. Such a composition can be executed effectively only with a microservices-based architecture. 

So, the goal of microservices architecture is to help financial institutes and banks align together services from different platforms into unity to offer a unique service to customers.

To know more about iView Labs, kindly log on to our website www.iviewlabs.com and to get in touch with us with your queries and needs just write us an email on info@iviewlabs.com and sales@iviewlabs.com. Download the latest portfolio to see our work.

9 key points to decide on Microservices Architecture

Microservices Architecture is a great way to structure your single monolithic codebases. It gives an opportunity to scale the architecture, giving you complete portability of an application. But before going through all the benefits of microservices, it is important that we understand the key points of Microservices Architecture in order to get the maximum value out of the entire structure.

Best practices to include while implementing Microservices Architecture 

  1. Why Microservices Architecture?

First, identify the need whether micro services architecture for your cloud application development is going to be really beneficial or not. The biggest advantage of microservices is the way it disintegrates  data and operations. This distributed system will  help to partition all your data into different services. This gives an option to scale the system along with the data that needs to be prescribed independently so that the service logic is separate. You will need to identify whether such separation of data, components and services which  brings scalability  is really required for your product, use case or a business application on cloud..

  1. Resources

Each unit in the application runs with its own runtime and different processing threads giving it a better elasticity than the monolithic architecture. If you need such elasticity and scale, you will have to plan your resources, separating data; teams separated, leading to efficient ways of managing  each service independently irrespective of resources.

  1. Define the kind of microservices 

The success of microservices architecture is mainly on  how you design, define and architect this system. Before implementing it is important to clearly understand your business function, your use case, your modules,, services, and to understand how these different modules will interchange and exchange data into each other. A clarity on your business function is important to define the architecture that subsides in the system with fragmentation. So, remember to recognize your business functionality far ahead to build optimal microservice architecture.

  1. Recognizing Scalability of your Structure 

Scalability being the major aspect of microservices, it allows an application to be broken down into units and then concurrently being processed in parallel. Thereafter, increasing the overall efficiency of the application. So, while inducing scalability identify these aspects in your system – resource bottlenecks for read and write traffic.

Start by knowing and understanding the nature of growth your system would have. Assess this on predetermined data or put your assumptions to design a system with a performance benchmark to understand it’s  qualitative growth scale. Thereafter is the capacity planning, this is where quantitative and qualitative growth comes into play. Next is dependency scaling; You need to understand the interdependent scenarios which could lead to bottlenecks for fetching and writing data into your databases. This is where a well defined decoupled module would help to bring that scale for your system.

  1. Ensuring Cost Vs Benefit 

All in all, Microservices Architecture transformation will lead to an independent management of services which will give your application an agility that will facilitate continuous delivery and faster time to market. Ofcourse, initially when you are building with a microservices architecture, it will take time and cost of it will increase but you build your systems with a mindset of modernization and to sustain for the future  for at least for 5 years.  Implementing the microservice architecture isn’t only a technical decision this kind of transformation also requires a buy-in from the stakeholders into account to ensure that any system that you are  building is able to sustain. So, before your monolithic architecture is transformed into microservices or needs to be modernized we need to understand what are the benefits it’s going to bring for the system in the longer run. 

  1. A good set of DevOps toolkit

To get an optimal value out of your new architecture you need to automate your services testing, build and deploy management. Therefore it is important to set up a good set of DevOps process as you will find it faster to release your application. 

  1. A single entry point

Implement an API Gateway which is  a single entry point for all the requests of your client. Since in microservices architecture, each service is managed independently, from its authentication, business logic and database, we need a common gateway to interact with different services of the system. This helps in distributing your client requests separately for each service. Also, it gives an advantage to host and request each service of your application differently.  The communication protocol between your product and services should be as simple as possible and it would be incharge of transmitting the data without changing it. Microservice architectures have the capability to keep data or resources as straightforward as possible to avoid tight coupling of the elements. In some opportunities you might find yourself using an event driven architecture with asynchronous message wise communications.

  1. Keep in mind the challenges

We know microservices can provide you great benefits from decoupling, fragmentation, flexibility to scalability. But you can come across various challenges when you work on it as a whole system. As your system is divided into distributed systems it can now have multiple bottleneck points, so you need to take in account the multiple bottlenecks points. Along with it you also need to understand network hops it may have due to fragmented services. Hence the question is whether my application really needs a microservices architecture.

  1. Reduce Deployment Friction

Microservices can sustainably support continuous delivery as you have an increasing number of services that need to be deployed multiple times a day. So it is critical that you go with continuous delivery to minimize the risks of release failure, as well as ensuring that your resources are focused on building and running the application rather than being stuck at the deployment stage. 

The biggest commercial Advantage that Microservice Architecture provides: 

The biggest advantage is that microservices give an opportunity to scale, to manage, to integrate independently which helps to bring agility in your application. Also, with decoupling, it gives you a possibility to scale each service independently. We would highly recommend Micro services architecture for applications which have third party API integrations, Internal multiple Business logic  scenarios, Multiple product offerings where there is a way to scale, manage and integrate each service module independently.

To know more about iView Labs, kindly log on to our website www.iviewlabs.com and to get in touch with us with your queries and needs just write us an email on info@iviewlabs.com and sales@iviewlabs.com. Download the latest portfolio to see our work.